Pairing People with Products: Anthropomorphizing the Object,Dehumanizing the Person

We present the first empirical integration of anthropomorphism and dehumanization, two intrinsically linked processes representing the extent to which the concept of humanness is activated for a given target. Across several experiments, we demonstrate that pairing a person and object in an ad, while focusing respondent attention on the object, leads to its being anthropomorphized and evaluated better compared to presenting it alone. However, compared to presenting a person alone, the same pairing leads to inferior evaluations of the person through a process of dehumanization. We rule out two alternative explanations for these effects, namely the transfer of an object's qualities to the person and consumption associations, and conduct a post‐test that provides additional support for our proposed activation/inhibition of humanness account. Finally, we inspect several moderators, finding that anthropomorphism only occurs with moderately and highly functional objects and dehumanization occurs irrespective of the person's gender or fame. By incorporating the literature on dehumanization, we propose new research questions to motivate future inquiry.     

The Spirit(s) of Science: Paradoxical Positivism as Religious Discourse among Spiritualists

This article examines a narrative dilemma that popular texts on evolution face. On the one hand, popular science tends to privilege linear and culturally familiar narrative structures, as previous studies of popularization have often emphasized. On the other hand, however, the Darwinian idea of natural selection resists linear narration, as narrative theorist H. Porter Abbott has argued. This resistance arises from the fact that evolution by natural selection lacks proper narrative entities and narrative events and that it relies on two parallel narrative levels, the levels of species and organism. This paper explores how two popular science books on evolution negotiate this narrative dilemma by introducing a third narrative level. Both texts appropriate characteristics from the narrative levels of species and organism and project them on molecular and minute scales by portraying evolution as a micro-narrative that takes place in chromosomes, genes, cells and microscopic details of human organs. While this textual strategy produces a coherent and compelling narrative that for the most part succeeds in masking the structural gap between the narrative levels of species and organism, it also risks naturalizing cultural imagery. In particular, this micro-narrative tends to represent popular gender ideologies as biological truths embedded in molecular processes within our bodies.     

Children's understanding of human and super-natural mind

Barrett, Richert, and Driesenga [Barrett, J. L., Richert, R. A., & Driesenga, A. (2001). God's beliefs versus mother's: The development of nonhuman agents concepts. Child Development, 72(1), 50–65] have suggested that children are able to conceptualize the representational properties held by certain super-natural entities, such as God, before they achieve representational understanding of the human mind. The two experimental conditions of the present study aimed at cross-checking the above suggestion. One hundred and twenty children aged from 3 to 7 years were involved in both conditions. In the first, a modified perspective-taking and appearance-reality task, similar to that adopted in Barrett et al.'s study, was used. The task in the second addressed another aspect of representational understanding of the human mind, that is, the early emerging of the rule that knowledge is constrained by perception. The results of the study showed that younger children systematically treat God as a human protagonist regarding the representational properties they possess. Moreover, it was found that children are able to reason, accurately, about God's representational properties, only upon reaching their 5th year of age, when their representational understanding of the human mind becomes stable and robust.     

How Children and Adults Represent God's Mind

For centuries, humans have contemplated the minds of gods. Research on religious cognition is spread across sub‐disciplines, making it difficult to gain a complete understanding of how people reason about gods' minds. We integrate approaches from cognitive, developmental, and social psychology and neuroscience to illuminate the origins of religious cognition. First, we show that although adults explicitly discriminate supernatural minds from human minds, their implicit responses reveal far less discrimination. Next, we demonstrate that children's religious cognition often matches adults' implicit responses, revealing anthropomorphic notions of God's mind. Together, data from children and adults suggest the intuitive nature of perceiving God's mind as human‐like. We then propose three complementary explanations for why anthropomorphism persists in adulthood, suggesting that anthropomorphism may be (a) an instance of the anchoring and adjustment heuristic; (b) a reflection of early testimony; and/or (c) an evolutionary byproduct.     

The influence of anthropomorphic tendencies on human hoarding behaviours

Hoarding is the excessive acquisition of and failure to discard possessions. Previous research has shown a link between anthropomorphism (the tendency to ascribe human characteristics to non-human objects) and hoarding. Here we assess the psychometric properties of a new Anthropomorphism Questionnaire (AQ) in a nonclinical sample of 264 adults. A further sample of 93 participants was then recruited to assess relationships between hoarding behaviours and cognitions, scores on the AQ, an existing anthropomorphism questionnaire (Individual Differences in Anthropomorphism Questionnaire: IDAQ), and a measure of social anxiety. Regression analyses revealed the AQ but not the IDAQ to be a significant predictor for hoarding behaviours. Women showed stronger childhood anthropomorphising behaviours than men, and younger participants showed stronger anthropomorphising and hoarding cognitions and behaviours. We conclude that the AQ better supports the predicted relationship between anthropomorphism and hoarding than the IDAQ. We also suggest that age and sex need to be more carefully considered in future studies on anthropomorphism and hoarding.     

Conferring humanness: The role of anthropomorphism in hoarding

Hoarding is characterized by a persistent and extreme difficulty with discarding one’s possessions, often resulting in cluttered living spaces and marked distress or impairment. Despite being increasingly recognized as a substantial public health burden, much remains unknown about the etiology. One facet within the cognitive-behavioral model of hoarding that remains poorly understood is the strong emotional attachment to possessions. The tendency to anthropomorphize (i.e., see human-like qualities in non-human entities) may be one possible mechanism contributing to this emotional attachment. The current report is the first empirical study to examine the association between anthropomorphism and hoarding. Non-clinical participants (n = 72) completed a battery of self-report measures focused on hoarding symptoms, saving cognitions, anthropomorphism, and emotional attachments to personal and novel items. Anthropomorphic tendencies were significantly associated with greater saving behaviors and the acquisition of free things. Levels of anthropomorphism moderated the relationship between specific hoarding beliefs and acquiring tendencies, as well as the emotional attachment towards a novel item. Results are discussed with regard to future research directions, and implications for the cognitive-behavioral model of hoarding.     

Anthropomorphism and anthropectomy as friendly competitors

Principles help comparative psychologists select from among multiple hypotheses that account for the data. Anthropomorphic principles select hypotheses that have the most human–animal similarities while anthropectic principles select hypotheses that have the most human–animal differences. I argue that there is no way for the comparative psychologist on their own to justify their selection of one principle over the other. However, the comparative psychologist can justify their selection of one principle over the other in virtue of being members of comparative psychology as a community. As it turns out, though, this justifies both competing principles: the community benefits most from competition between the two principles so comparative psychologists are justified in implementing the principles by which they can best contribute to the competition. Thus, I argue that common arguments to unify principle implementation in comparative psychology are defeated by the conservative arguments to preserve and foster competition.     

Theoretical,and epistemological challenges in scientific investigations of complex emotional states in animals

This review brings to light critical epistemological and theoretical considerations when studying complex emotional states in animals. We discuss anthropomorphic and Umwelt perspectives of nonhuman animals and the ways in which distinct theories of consciousness and neural processing may restrict the potential for the development of knowledge on the topic. Within the same line of argumentation, we consider influences of the debate between monism and dualism and psychology’s behaviorism and cognitive theories. Finally, we contrast the affective consciousness, higher-order emotional consciousness, and constructed emotion theories to further our understanding of complex emotional states in animals.